The development of social aggression and physical aggression: A narrative analysis of interpersonal conflicts

Using conflict narratives reported by children and adolescents, this study investigated the development and social functions of social aggression in comparison to physical aggression. A total of 510 participants in two cohorts of a longitudinal study were involved (116 girls and 104 boys from Grade 4 and155 girls and 135 boys from Grade 7). Patterns of social aggression and physical aggression were identified based on interview reports in the first year of the study. Results showed that a triadic structure of social relationship was often reported in conflicts where social aggression was employed, whereas a dyadic structure was reported in conflicts involving physical aggression. Girls tended to use social aggression against girls, whereas boys tended to use physical aggression against boys. Children and adolescents who were central in peer social networks were more likely to employ social aggression than those who were peripheral in the networks. Social aggression was not reliably linked to concurrent or future problematic adjustment. Physical aggression, however, was not related to network centrality but was linked to concurrent and future maladjustment (e.g., low academic competence and school dropout). Aggr. Behav. 28:341–355, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Sampling in research on interpersonal aggression

The aim of this study was to investigate the usefulness of convenience samples in research on interpersonal aggression among adults. It was hypothesised that convenience sampled targets of aggression differs from targets in general with regards to both demographic characteristics and degree of aggression exposed to. A convenience sample comprising support-seeking targets of workplace bullying was compared with a representative sample of Norwegian targets of bullying. The results showed that the two samples differed significantly on all demographic variables investigated, except gender. A far higher percentage of the convenience sample had blown the whistle on illegal, immoral or illegitimate practice at their workplace, whereas they also reported significantly more frequent and more intense exposure to aggression. The findings confirm that convenience samples have low external validity when generalising to the general population. Such samples should therefore mainly be used to investigate tendencies in, and the phenomenology of, interpersonal aggression, in studies where generalisability is not the principal objective.     

Empathy as a cognitive inhibitor of interpersonal aggression

The studies presented in this paper examined empathy, especially perspective taking, as a potential inhibitor of interpersonal aggression. The theoretical rationale for these investigations derived from Zillmann's [(1988): Aggressive Behavior 14: 51–64] cognitive excitation model. Study 1 revealed that dispositional empathy correlates negatively with self-reported aggression and with conflict responses that reflect little concern for the needs of the other party. Empathy also was positively related to constructive responses to interpersonal conflict (i. e., those that do involve concern for the needs of the other party). In Study 2, perspective taking was manipulated with instructions to subjects prior to participation in a reaction-time task designed to measure aggression. When threat was relatively low, subjects who were instructed to take the perspective of the target responded less aggressively than did those who had been instructed to focus on the task. Study 3 examined the effect of dispositional perspective taking on verbal aggression. Threat was manipulated in terms of the combination of provocation and gender of the interactants. As predicted, perspective taking related to aggression inhibition under conditions of moderate threat–for males under low provocation and females under high provocation. These effects were predicted and explained in the context of the cognitive-excitation model. © 1994 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Young adults' media use and attitudes toward interpersonal and institutional forms of aggression

Links between media violence exposure and favorable attitudes toward interpersonal violence are well established, but few studies have examined whether associations extend to include favorable attitudes toward institutional forms of aggression. Studies on this topic have not assessed multiple forms of media use and statistically controlled for individual characteristics likely to influence attitudes beyond sociodemographic information. In this study, undergraduate students (N=319) aged 18-20 years (56% male) completed a survey assessing media use (number of hours per week spent playing videogames, watching movies/TV shows, watching TV sports) and attitudes toward interpersonal violence, punitive criminal justice policies, and different types of military activities (preparedness/defense and aggressive intervention). Greater number of hours spent watching TV contact sports was associated with more favorable attitudes toward military preparedness/defense, aggressive military intervention, and punitive criminal justice policies among men independently of parental education, lifetime violence exposure within the home and community, aggressive personality, and constrained problem solving style. Greater number of hours spent watching violent movies/TV was associated with more favorable attitudes toward military preparedness/defense among men and with more favorable attitudes toward interpersonal violence and punitive criminal justice policies among women, but these associations became non-significant when adjusting for covariates.     

Justification of interpersonal aggression in Japanese,American, and Spanish students

Six hundred and thirty‐two university students of both sexes—242 Japanese (137 males and 105 females), 190 Spanish (71 males and 119 females), and 200 American (100 males and 100 females)—completed a questionnaire that examined their attitudes toward various kinds of aggression directed at other people in different situations that ranged from self‐defense to a method of overcoming communication problems. Factor analysis revealed three factors: physical aggression (killing, torture, and hitting), direct verbal aggression (shouting and rage), and indirect verbal aggression (being ironic and hindering). The basic factor structure of the Japanese, the Spanish, and the USA samples was similar. In all samples, men showed a higher justification of physical aggressive acts in any situation and of indirect verbal aggression in nondefensive circumstances. Cultural differences were found in the degree of justification of the three factors: in all kinds of situations, Japanese students showed a lower justification of indirect verbal aggression but a higher justification of direct verbal aggression than USA and Spain samples. Physical aggression in defensive situations is justified more by Americans than by Japanese and Spanish students. These findings suggest the existence of a common basic moral code about physical aggressive acts, but there seems to be a cultural influence on moral codes concerning verbal aggressive acts. Oriental cultures, with an interdependent construal of self, seem to be more permissive of direct verbal aggression compared with Western cultures, but they have less tolerance for indirect verbal aggression. There were practically no significant differences between American and Spanish scores. Aggr. Behav. 25:185–195, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Social inference and individual differences in aggression: Evidence for spontaneous judgments of hostility

This research examined the hypothesis that aggressive vs. nonaggressive individuals differ in their spontaneous trait inferences, i. e., inferences made without any conscious intention of inferring characteristics of an actor. We anticipated that spontaneous processing conditions would be more revealing of aggressive/nonaggressive differences than would conditions that prompt deliberate inference processes. We used a cued-recall paradigm. Aggressive and nonaggressive subjects were instructed to memorize sentences that were open to either hostile or nonhostile interpretations. Sentence recall was then cued by either hostile dispositional terms or by words that were linked semantically to the element of the sentences. Within the spontaneous inference condition, semantic cues prompted twice as much recall as hostile cues among nonaggressive subjects, whereas dispositional cues aided recall more than semantic cues among aggressive subjects. As predicted, within the delinerate inference conditions there were no aggressive/nonaggressive differences. The nature of spontaneous vs. deliberate inferential processes and the advantages of spontaneous inference paradigms for testing predictions about schema-based processing in aggression are discussed. © 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Dramatology in life,disorder, and psychoanalytic therapy: A further contribution to interpersonal psychoanalysis

Abstract

Action and interaction, and emotion and thought as the inner wellsprings of action, play a central role in the lives of individuals, families, and society, spanning the continuum between everyday life and disorder. Until now, the narrative tradition has been the main methodology for portraying and formulating human action and interaction, and little has been written about the dramatic approach to life, disorder, and therapy. Since the essence of drama is action, dialogue, character, and emotion, it is time to give drama its due. The author proposes a methodological concept – dramatology – analogous to narratology, to highlight the dramatic method of investigating action and interaction in life, disorder, and therapy. Breuer and Freud presented both aspects of dramatology: dramatization in dream and fantasy, and dramatization in act, focusing on the person. This approach was elaborated by psychoanalysts with an interpersonal orientation, focusing on the person and speech as action. Dramatology is applied to exploring ongoing patient–therapist interactions as reality and as transference. Analyzing unconscious and latent dramatization in dream, fantasy, and enactment with free association is enhanced by utilizing clarification and confrontation, focusing on the manifest and mutually observable expressive form and style of actions and enactments, defenses and resistances, and the discharge and meaning of emotions. Dramatology puts forward a new paradigm for psychiatry, psychotherapy, and psychoanalysis.     

Naturalistic versus experimental approaches to aggression; theoretical and methodological issues

Various strategies to study human aggression are described, accompanied by a discussion of four major issues. It is concluded that the three major goals of research, precise measurement, realism, and generality, cannot be achieved in a single study or series of studies using only one paradigm. Investigators of a particular problem need to develop a research program that incorporates a number of strategies; hypotheses generated “in the street” need to be tested in the laboratory and vice versa.     

Suicide as an interpersonal phenomenon: Dyadic methodological and statistical considerations in suicide research

Interpersonal risk and resilience factors are prominent in current conceptual models of suicide. A growing body of empirical evidence links suicidal thoughts and behaviors to a range of interpersonal phenomenon adding further support to the value of this line of inquiry. At present, research on interpersonal phenomenon focuses on assessing individuals' perceptions of interpersonal phenomenon, such as appraisals of burdensomeness, experienced loneliness, and thwarted belongingness. As this line of research continues to develop, we argue that it would be valuable to consider incorporating conceptual models of interpersonal phenomenon and corresponding methodological approaches from closely allied fields. After providing a brief overview of interpersonal models of suicide, we present an introduction to conceptual models of interpersonal phenomenon developed in relationship science, describe how these models can be applied to the study of interpersonal phenomenon in suicide research, and close with a guided tutorial on data collection and statistical analysis methods for testing hypotheses derived from these conceptual approaches. References for additional reading are provided, and the Appendix S1 provides simulated data sets and statistical code for the analyses in the tutorial section.     

Increasing wealth inequality may increase interpersonal hostility: The relationship between personal relative deprivation and aggression

In most Western societies, wealth inequality is increasing, which in turn could increase people’s belief that one’s standing is relatively disadvantaged. Based on relative deprivation theory, we argue that such an experience of personal relative deprivation should causally lead to greater interpersonal hostility. Indeed, three experiments show that participants in a personal relative deprivation condition reported higher levels of aggressive affect and behaved more aggressively than participants in a personal relative gratification condition. Compared to a control condition, participants experiencing personal relative deprivation were more aggressive rather than participants experiencing personal relative gratification being less aggressive. However, personal relative deprivation increased aggressive behavior only toward targets that were the source for participants’ experience of disadvantage, but it did not increase aggression toward neutral targets.     

The longitudinal relationships of interpersonal openness trait,hostility, and hostile attribution bias

While the relationship between personality, hostility, and hostile attribution bias (HAB) has been explored in previous studies, their longitudinal relationship is unclear, and no related study has utilized the indigenous Chinese personality. This research explored the longitudinal relationships of interpersonal openness (IO; an indigenous Chinese personality construct), hostility, and HAB. The 942 valid participants (38.5% male, mean age = 20.83, standard deviation = 1.04) were from six different provinces in China. Measurements were completed on two separate occasions (Times 1 and 2), with a 6-month interval. Results showed that IO has longitudinal effects on hostility, after controlling for the Big Five, and HAB could be longitudinally predicted by IO and hostility as well. Moreover, hostility served as a mediator in the relationship between IO and HAB. These results suggest that IO can affect the development of hostility and HAB, and some indigenous Chinese personality factors may complement Western personality theories.     

Aggression in young children—introduction: Some methodological issues related to the nature of aggression

Aggression is not an isolated phenomenon but part of a child's social world which has to be considered as a whole. The issues to be taken in consideration studying it are related to the methods used to assess aggression and also to its classification.     

Alcohol-aggression expectancies and dispositional rumination moderate the effect of alcohol consumption on alcohol-related aggression and hostility

Alcohol consumption increases aggression, but only in some drinkers. This study extends previous work to show how expectancies for alcohol-induced aggression and dispositional rumination moderate the link between alcohol consumption and alcohol-related aggression and hostility in a sample of 285 men and women. Alcohol-aggression expectancies and quantity of alcohol interacted to predict alcohol-related hostility and aggression. Trait rumination moderated the effect of alcohol consumption on aggressive acts. Finally, women who ruminated were more likely to report alcohol-related aggression than were men who ruminated. These results suggest that alcohol expectancies for aggression and rumination constitute two important cognitive facilitators of alcohol-related aggression and hostility, and that gender plays an important role in these relations.     

自恋与攻击性关系的元分析

本研究采用元分析技术探讨自恋与攻击性的关系。通过文献检索和筛选, 共纳入原始文献121篇, 含177个独立样本, 参与者总数达73687名。元分析的结果显示, 自恋与攻击性存在显著正相关, 二者关系受性别和自恋报告方式的调节, 但不受攻击性报告方式和文化的调节。同时, 不同类型的自恋与攻击性呈现出不同的相关程度, 内隐自恋与攻击性的相关程度高于外显自恋, 非适应性自恋与攻击性的相关程度高于适应性自恋。后续的研究应加强自恋测量的准确性, 注重探讨不同类型自恋与不同类型攻击性的关系。     

The reduction of psychological aggression across varied interpersonal contexts through repentance and forgiveness

Research on the resolution of interpersonal conflict has shown that forgiveness is important in reducing aggression and promoting prosocial interactions following a transgression. Although the benefits of forgiveness have been demonstrated in a variety of relationship contexts, a single theoretical model has not been tested across these different contexts. In this study, we employed an attributional framework to examine the relationship between attributions of responsibility for a transgression, repentance, emotions, forgiveness, and psychological aggression toward three different categories of transgressor: a coworker, a friend, and a romantic partner. One hundred and seven participants were asked to describe a recent transgression with a coworker, a friend, and a romantic partner. In each case, responsibility for the event, the degree to which the transgressor apologized, anger, sympathy, forgiveness, and subsequent psychological aggression toward the transgressor were measured. A basic model of aggression reduction, whereby repentance facilitates forgiveness and reduces psychological aggression, was reliable in each category of transgressor. A comparison of the models showed minor differences in how individuals respond to transgressors. Although coworkers apologized less, they were just as likely to be forgiven as romantic partners and friends. In addition, participants were least likely to respond with psychological aggression when a friend transgressed against them. This research provides a theoretical framework within which to study forgiveness and aggression across a variety of contexts. Aggr. Behav. 32:1–12, 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

攻击性和自尊关系的元分析

以往攻击性和自尊之间关系的研究结论存在很大分歧。为了综合以往研究,明确两者之间的整体关系,分析造成分歧的原因,81项原始研究进入了元分析。结果显示:(1)攻击性和自尊呈中等程度的负相关。(2)自尊的不同结构与不同类型的攻击性呈现不同的相关模式。攻击性与外显自尊和内隐自尊呈负相关;攻击性与自尊稳定性和相倚性呈正相关(3)年级和攻击性量表类型的调节效应显著。攻击性与高自尊异质性之间的关系是将来研究的重点。     

Cultural and sex differences in aggression: A comparison between Japanese and Spanish students using two different inventories

Two self‐report inventories developed to assess different dimensions of aggression, the Aggression Questionnaire and the EXPAGG, were administered to a sample (N = 400) of men and women undergraduates in two Japanese and Spanish universities. The factor structure of scales was assessed using exploratory factor analysis. Both questionnaires showed high correlations between their respective scales. In both cultures, males reported more physical aggression, verbal aggression, and hostility as well as higher instrumental beliefs, whereas females reported more expressive representation than males. Japanese students reported more physical aggression than their Spanish counterparts, who reported more verbal aggression, hostility, and anger and more expressive representation of aggression. Aggr. Behav. 27:313–322, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Direct and indirect relationships among posttraumatic stress disorder,depression, hostility,anger, and verbal and physical aggression in returning veterans

Hostility, anger, and aggression are conceptually related but unique constructs found to occur more often among veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) than among civilians or veterans without PTSD. However, the pathways between PTSD, depression, hostility, anger, and aggression have not been comprehensively characterized. Therefore, drawing on a sample of returning Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom combat veterans ( N = 175; 95% male; mean age 30 years), this study sought to examine the direct and indirect relationships among PTSD, depression, hostility, anger, and four types of aggression: verbal, and physical toward self, others, and objects. Functional modeling of direct effects was done using multiple least-squares regression and bootstrapped mediation analyses were carried out to test indirect effects. Results indicate that PTSD is not the overall direct contributor to different forms of aggression, supporting the mediating role of depression and trait anger. Depression symptoms explain part of the relationships between PTSD and verbal aggression, physical aggression toward objects, and physical aggression toward self and trait anger explains part of the relationships between PTSD and verbal aggression, physical aggression toward objects, and physical aggression toward others. Our findings support the importance of assessing for anger, depression, and different types of aggression among veterans presenting for PTSD treatment to develop individualized treatment plans that may benefit from early incorporation of interventions.